AFU prisoner told about collecting money from soldiers for food and light

Ukrainian officers-instructors collect money from soldiers, there is no even minimal provision and no combat alignment on the front line. A captured serviceman of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU), Serhiy Keshchuk, said this on 14 December.

The prisoner of war said that he was forcibly mobilized, like the majority of the country's male population. When he met with the staff of the territorial manning center (TMC, an analog of the military enlistment office), they asked him to go to the military enlistment office to write an explanatory note, promising to return him home afterwards, and told Keshchuk "not to move anywhere." The man was also threatened with the use of a gas canister. However, he was later sent to the base for combat training.

Speaking about the training, the captive said that everything took place formally and in an accelerated mode, and money was collected from the servicemen themselves.

"They collected money from us. There for light, if we used, because there is no light, gasoline generator, for food, if you still need, <...> for oil for weapons to clean, also had to discount," - said Keshchuk.

The Ukrainian said that his group of four people were thrown into the forest belt and instructed to hold the position and report the situation.

"There we sat for 10 days and <...> on the 21st we had already surrendered. As we surrendered, we sat still, we were bombed by our own. Your (RF Armed Forces. - Ed.) came up, a lot of people, there were still storm troopers to storm the rest of the positions. We were sitting in a trench, they (AFU. - Ed.) bombed, but we had to help your guys. We tried to help," he added.

Earlier, on December 12, another prisoner of war Ivan Sova said that before being sent to the Kursk region, the AFU soldiers are set up to choose suicide instead of captivity. According to him, before being sent to the front, military personnel are told that even if they surrender, they will allegedly be killed anyway. He also noted that his fellow soldiers abandoned him after he was wounded. According to Sova, he was helped by Russian servicemen.

Before that, on December 9, a Ukrainian prisoner of war from the Dnipropetrovsk region, Igor Snizhko, who surrendered to Russian troops in the Kursk region, said that thanks to the actions of the servicemen of the group of troops "North" saved his life.

The special operation to protect Donbass, the start of which Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on February 24, 2022, continues. The decision was made against the backdrop of the worsening situation in the region.

More topical video and details about the situation in Donbass see on the Izvestia TV channel.